Microsoft stops insisting you need a "Copilot+ PC"
Ars Technica Scharon Harding ● Covered by 2 sources
Microsoft’s new Surface PCs meet Copilot+ rules, but the label is gone. The AI badge is fading even on the machines built to qualify.
Based on reporting by Ars Technica, Scharon Harding — read the original for the full story.
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Microsoft has quietly stepped back from pushing Copilot+ PC as the thing buyers should look for. The company launched the branding in 2024 to make it easier to spot Windows machines meant for local AI work, but the new Surface PCs announced this week don’t carry it at all.
That’s odd because Microsoft says they still clear the bar. Brett Ostrum, a corporate vice president for Surface, told Windows Central the new Surface computers “are not called Copilot+ PCs” even though they meet the old requirements. He added that Microsoft still likes “the narrative around AI on the edge” and a hybrid setup.
Those requirements were never tiny. Copilot+ PCs need 16GB of RAM, 256GB of storage, and an integrated NPU rated at 40 TOPS or more. Microsoft’s new Surface Pro 12-inch (2nd Edition) and Surface Laptop 13-inch (2nd Edition), due October 13, both use Qualcomm Snapdragon X2 Plus chips and a Qualcomm Hexagon NPU rated at 80 TOPS.
Qualcomm’s Kedar Kondap told Windows Central that the point of Copilot+ PCs was to define devices that could deliver NPU features. But he also suggested the label itself may be slipping out of view, saying the same experiences can still be offered “without just using [Copilot+ PC] terminology now.”
Microsoft’s own marketing tells the same story. A page that was still live in May, according to the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine, called Copilot+ PCs “a class of AI PCs and laptops” and “the fastest, most intelligent Windows PCs ever.” That page now redirects to a more generic “performance PCs” page, where Copilot+ PCs still appear, just not with the old fanfare.
My take — AI-written commentary, not fact-checked reporting
This is what happens when a label outlives its usefulness: the marketing team quietly backs away while the hardware keeps doing the same job. The whole Copilot+ push always smelled like a category made to be explained, which is usually a sign the category needed less explaining, not more. Microsoft can keep the AI story; the badge looks optional now.
Read more about this at: Ars Technica
